Les Greenwood of East Mountain also facing additional charges

Controversial East Mountain resident Les Greenwood has been charged with first-degree murder in the 2000 shooting deaths of Barry Kirk Mersereau and his common-law wife Nancy Christensen.

Greenwood, 41, has also been charged with accessory after the fact to murder in the homicide of outlaw biker Randy Mersereau (Kirk’s brother) and with the same individual’s attempted murder in the September 2000 bombing of a used car dealership in Bible Hill.

He has been remanded into custody and is to appear in provincial court in Halifax this morning to face the charges.

RCMP said this morning that Greenwood was arrested without incident at a residence in Bramber, Hants County early Thursday morning.

Hells Angel member Jeff Lynds of North River has been named by police as Randy Mersereau’s killer while Salmon River resident Gerald MacCabe has been charged as an accessory for allegedly helping Lynds escape custody.

Kirk Mersereau was 48 and Christensen was 47 when they were gunned down in their Hants County home in September 2000.

The investigation into his brother’s death renewed in earnest in October when the RCMP spent a week searching an Onslow Mountain home. Then, last week, the investigation moved to North River and on Sunday, after several days of searching, police discovered skeletal human remains in a wooded area off the Hiram Lynds Road.

Those remains have not been identified.

Shortly after Mersereau disappeared in October 1999, Lynds became a full-patch member of the Hells Angels and was later named by police as having moved on to the outlaw bike gang's elite Nomad chapter in Ontario.

At last report, Lynds was in custody in a Montreal jail where he is facing first-degree charges in a double homicide.

Just prior to the slayings of Kirk Mersereau and Christensen, west Colchester resident Charles Robert Maddison also suddenly disappeared.

His bank account remained untouched and his 1989 Dodge Dakota truck was found burned in a remote gravel pit 40 kilometres from the Mersereau/Christensen murder scene, which prompted police to look for a possible link. A police spokesperson at the time suggested if there was a connection, it would be a case of Maddison being an innocent victim of a criminal offence.

When asked on Friday about the Maddison investigation, RCMP major crimes spokeswoman Sgt. Brigdit Leger said she could not offer specifics.

“I can’t disclose any information about any specific file that may be under investigation. I can confirm that these three investigations here are still very much ongoing. As with any missing persons files in the province of Nova Scotia they remain open and are actively reviewed by the investigators,” she said.

Greenwood, who until recently lived at 882 Pictou Rd. in East Mountain, has been the consternation of his neighbours there because of the long-standing unsightly condition of his property.

During a dangerous and unsightly hearing at Colchester County council in April 2009, one neighbour described Greenwood’s property as "disgraceful" and a "safety hazard" because of the accumulation of automotive parts, junk, debris and wood scattered throughout the yard. Greenwood was ordered by the county on a number of occasions to have the property cleaned up and after fire destroyed his home last year, a mobile trailer was placed on the lot.

The county ultimately informed Greenwood that mobile trailers cannot be used as a permanent resident and it has been removed from the property.

Some residents in the area have reported seeing a vehicle with Quebec license plates parked at various locations in the area this week but Leger said she had no information whether it was at all linked to the case. But Leger added that she does not think that residents have anything to fear.

“We do not believe that these are random,” she said, of the three deaths. “The accused and the victims were known to each other and at this point in time we do not believe that there is any additional risk to the general public….”